Leading Maltese political journalist killed by car bomb

Daphne Caruana Galizia, a leading Maltese journalist who had reported extensively on government corruption, was killed in a car bombing Monday, according to TVM, the country’s public broadcaster.

The explosion took place near her home in Bidnija at approximately 2:30 p.m., minutes after her last blog post was published.

Caruana Galizia, 53, had spent the last year publishing stories about allegations of corruption involving Prime Minister Joseph Muscat and his closest allies. The story first came to light in the Panama Papers scandal — a leak in April 2016 of more than 11 million documents from the Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca.

She subsequently published stories alleging that Muscat’s wife, Michelle, received $1 million from the daughter of Azerbaijan’s president through a company set up by the same law firm.

In response to her death, Prime Minister Muscat, who has denied all allegations, made a statement saying: “Everyone knows Ms. Caruana Galizia was a harsh critic of mine, both politically and personally, but nobody can justify this barbaric act in any way … I will not rest before justice is done.”

Galizia — who was named by POLITICO as one of 28 individuals who would have a major impact on Europe in 2017 — was regularly accused by the ruling Labour Party of writing fake news. Her stories led to ministers, including Muscat, suing her for libel.

Adrian Delia, leader of the opposition Nationalist Party, described the event on Twitter as “the collapse of democracy and freedom of expression.”

When POLITICO met her in the run-up to a snap election called by Muscat this year, she said if Labour won, she would be concerned for her safety and would consider leaving the country. According to TVM, she had reported having received death threats to the police.

“We are appalled by yet another killed journalist in Europe,” said Mogens Blicher Bjerregård, president of the European Federation of Journalists. “This killing and its circumstances must be swiftly and thoroughly investigated.”

Joseph Daul, president of the pan-EU conservative European People’s Party, urged Maltese authorities “to launch an immediate investigation in order to shed light on this unspeakable act of violence and bring those responsible to justice.” That was echoed by Green MEP Sven Giegold, who said: “Such incidents bring to mind Putin’s Russia, not the European Union. There can be absolutely no tolerance for violence towards the press and freedom of expression in the European Union.”

Vishnou

Jessica Fletcher

After reading this article I’m left with the impression it was joey muscat that done it. Is that intentional or just a badly written article

Posted on 10/16/17 | 6:25 PM CEST

Deirdre Walsh

Who benefits from her death? The answer will give you the murderer. Corruption in the EU 27 is endemic. How thorough do you think the investigation will be- not very.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 7:14 PM CEST

glasspix 1

Muscat was given a free hand by his Brussels cronies to steal and lie as much as he wanted in return for fulfilling the migrant quotas and being a vocal critic of those who have refused. However, this assassination is a terrible escalation and the perpetrators must be brought to justice. Rest in peace Daphne.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 7:18 PM CEST

MLF

Harry Cooper fails to point out an essential piece of information in that her main and constant target in the past weeks was Adrian Delia, the new Nationalist Party (NP) leader, and his associates and not Joseph Muscat or the Labour Party. Through her persistent stance against and critique of Delia, DCG was leading de facto the faction of Nationalist Party voters who did not want to follow and vote for Delia in the next national election. Hence, DCG’s recent turn against the official leadership of the PN meant increasing drastically her political enemies. It is misleading to give the impression that her only political enemies were on the side of the Labour Party, the party which she had constantly criticised up till June 2017.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 7:20 PM CEST

Jim

@MLF: Your statement shows you know nothing about Malta’s situation.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 7:30 PM CEST

CSK

Mafiosa-style hit: mafiosa-style politics.

Until Malta (genuinely) cleans up its act, and Brussels stops pretending that Malta is anything but a crony-led money-laundering basket case, then no one is going to take the likes of Muscat’s pretence of innocence – or the EU’s utterances of law and order – seriously.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 7:33 PM CEST

MLF

@Jim
My comment was meant to balance Harry Cooper’s report which emphasised, one-sidedly in my view, the antagonism between DCG and the current Labour Party government. It restricted itself to emphasizing one essential aspect – a fact – of the recent political scenario in Malta preceding her death. Your comment on the other hand just hints at other dynamics and factors which, although maybe true, are too conveniently not expressed clearly and spelt out. Perhaps because they could be too easily criticised. Since you seem so confident to discard my previous comment, which you may well be justified to do, why not enlighten my and other readers’ ignorance by sharing the supposed and presumed understanding of Malta’s “real” situation you hinted at in your comment?

Posted on 10/16/17 | 7:49 PM CEST

alan

“This is a spiteful attack on a citizen and freedom of expression.”

or as it would be referred to in the rest of the world cold blooded murder &/ or political assassination.

One need look no further for culpability than the so-called Sovereign Military Order of Malta, aka the Papal Knights of Malta…together with the so-called Society of Jesus, aka the Jesuits as the fount of every brand of terrorism worldwide!

Posted on 10/16/17 | 8:27 PM CEST

Karlu

Why condemn prominent people outright when all they are doing is showing solidarity despite Ms Caruana Galizia having been a vocal critic? Shouldn’t the web of investigation be cast wider? Did she not make enemies of some important entrepreneurs? Another lady way back who spoke a great deal in favour of the environment left the country. I’m not in the know, perhaps someone more knowledgeable can enlighten? Could this lady still be alive if the newspapers had not insisted that she sign her name and not make use of the professional veil of secrecy accorded to the descrition of the media editors through use of a pen-name? Undoubtedly many more would have liked to forward their views but have kept back because of the fear of being got at in such a small country as Malta. This fear is a constant conditioning of the public ‘edited’ debate.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 10:00 PM CEST

johnathan

Malta and Gozo are slam bang on the migrant route: just wait until they start getting culturally enriched.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 10:48 PM CEST

Andrew Micallef

This is one of the saddest days in Malta’s existence. When the most prominent (and only) investigate journalist is savagely murdered in our so-called democratic country, you know things are bad. Mrs Caruana Galizia was a wonderful woman who made it her life’s work to expose the truth and only the truth for the public interest and for democracy. There is no else left to do this work in this spirit in the country. Threatened for so long, and even having her house set on fire, I still never expected it to come to this. She is a true martyr who died for our freedom of speech. The scum that did this must pay. RIP Daphne.

Posted on 10/16/17 | 11:19 PM CEST

PB

So a journalist investigating a European leader mysteriously gets blown up in the country that has just held the EU presidency…

Add to that the violent suppression of the Catalans, the funding of Turkish oppression of the Kurds, the Austrian election, French troops fighting on behalf of French energy companies in Niger, and you begin to get a picture of the utter hypocrisy of the EU on human rights.

Posted on 10/17/17 | 2:30 AM CEST

Edward Collis

Sad day. RIP Daphne.

Posted on 10/17/17 | 5:26 AM CEST

Jane

She wrote about everyone, and lately especially against the leader of the Opposition and new PN leader. Here is a sample from her blog

Jane

Deirdre Walsh without implying anything go to her blog and see that she was attacking the PN left right and centre. Seems that whenever the Nationalist Party is digging not scraping the bottom something horrible like this happens.

Posted on 10/17/17 | 8:02 AM CEST

Jane

Jessica Fletcher I would say intentional by those who want to harm Malta at all costs because this happens whenever the Nationalist Party is sent to the opposition benches. They always do their utmost to undermine Malta

Posted on 10/17/17 | 8:03 AM CEST

Vladimir Duterte

The woman was no journalist.She was a hate blogger who attacked anyone who did not share her political and elitist hatred and spite.
The woman had a long history of despicable blogs celebrating and cheering deaths of a former PM and former ministers,personal attacks on private persons and their families,personal attacks on other (real) journalists,revelling in the medical conditions of local politicians and spreading political hatred throughout.
Her death does not change the fact of the numerous lives she destroyed through her blogs and despicable vile rhetoric.
Her untimely and gruesome killing does not change her past.

Posted on 10/17/17 | 8:18 AM CEST

Jane

Simply LIES glasspix 1

Posted on 10/17/17 | 8:20 AM CEST

Jane

Jim your answer shows that you know absolutely nothing about Maltese politics.
Whenever the NP is digging the bottom something heinous happens.
Remember when Raymond Caruana was murdered just before the election for the NP to use his murder to win the election?
Remember how Eddie Fenech Adami the NP leader at the time told everyone that he knew who murdered Raymond Caruana and Karen Grech and he will tell us when he is elected but since the 30 years have passed and he told us nothing? People keep asking why he didn’t tell us.
Remember when a certain Cardona if I remember his surname correctly was fed up with the NP and was heard saying that he was going to spill the beans at a PN club and he was murdered the same day?
How many skeletons does the NP have in its cupboard?

Posted on 10/17/17 | 8:28 AM CEST

Jane

CSK you are lying because your NP has been sent to the opposition benches.
Your NP has always done it’s utmost throughout its history to undermine Malta by false allegations whenever it is sent to the opposition benches.
Remember the FALSE OATH by the drunkard Ettore Bono that he saw Lord Strickland dressed in Freemasons attire on the eve of the election for which certain people were imprisoned and if I remember correctly one of them was an ex-NP minister?
Remember how your NP ex-leader Eddie Fenech Adami LIED again on Dr ALfred Sant on the eve of the election that Dr Sant had not allowed EFA’s son to attend University?
Your NP is a party of LIES and False Oaths that undermines Malta at all costs whenever they are sent to the opposition benches.
Remember

Posted on 10/17/17 | 8:34 AM CEST

Jane

More links to her blog which clearly show whom she was attacking lately.

enthusiasmhttps://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2017/10/passive-resistance-just-plain-disorganisation-busuttils-picture-still-sliema-pn-club/
Passive resistance or plain disorganisation: Busuttil’s picture still up in Sliema PN club

ac

Where is EU Commission, Timmermans, Verhofstadt, Merkel, Macron with their mouths full of talk about ‘free press’, ‘human rights’ on many other occasions, etc. ?!?

Just imagine a mayhem that EU Commissars would start if something like that happened in Hungary, Czech Republic, Poland or Romania.
EU parliament debates, threats of sanctions, triggering article 7 of EU treaty and depriving of voice in the EU would follow immediately. Timmermans, Juncker, Macron would go mad on mainstream media every day on that.

But nothing like that happens in case of:
– Malta – where top journalist is assassinated
– Spain – trying to brutally crash democratic movement in Catalonia
– Germany – where Bundestag Scientific Office has just determined that Merkel’s decision to open borders to immigrants from all over the world had no legal grounds, where dieselgate and collusion among car producers has been tolerated for decades,
– France – with constantly extended ‘state of emergency’ depriving citizens of their basic rights which UN human rights experts and both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch condemned recently, attacks on basic EU values or breaching 3% budget deficit rule against EU treaties for years.

Posted on 10/17/17 | 11:09 AM CEST

pexit

After the silencing of all the press during 5 long day during the Christmas eve and the Cologne issue…after the start of control of “hate speech” the EUSSR go to the next step…

European “rule of law” will be respected by any meeans…the “freedom of speech” issue has been solved…now all investigation journalists know that they have only the right to expose the authorized only “truth” decided by the IV Reich and their corrupted puppets…

But as usual nothing to see for the EC because it’s a “good working” member of the junta of the IV Reich…The main problem in EU for the EC is the protection of the bark beetle in Poland which must be able to eat up all the primeval forest in peace…

Timmermans vakantie zijn gedaan…elite puppet…

Posted on 10/17/17 | 4:52 PM CEST

Chrish

Interesting in order to have an independent enquiry into her death the Maltese political authorities have felt the need to turn to the US and FBI and not the EU.

Posted on 10/17/17 | 5:06 PM CEST

tony

Jane

Far too many links. What about just giving us a summary? Thanks.

I know nothing at all of this person but she seemed to have many enemies.

Are there any theories as to who planted the bomb and why?

Posted on 10/17/17 | 5:57 PM CEST

CSK

@Jane

Your blitkrieg response does not change my comment above one iota, nor that of the nature of Maltese politics and the EU’s nature of turning a blind eye!